romney handled himself quite well. is he an adept debater. the problem is, it isn't a 1980s situation. the theory going into the race on the romney side is he has to show up and reassure people. that's what his whole convention was about. he has a much higher bar than that. he needs to convince people that his program is a better answer for the country. that's what he has to do. it's not going to be easy to do because there's going to be lots of distractions coming at him and the president himself is quite an adept debater. >> he had clinton at the convention. >> that comes down to the two theories of the race. one was right, one was wrong. the romney theory, tell ople it's okay even though the president's a nice guy to vote against him because everyone's primed to vote against him. the democrats went into the convention realizing they needed to make a substantive case and tear down romney's agenda. romney needs to build that up again. >> have you everybody observed, mortimer, how -- have you observed, mortimer, how much the president relies